POTTER Copies Sell Illegally in China

Illegal copies of HARRY POTTER AND THE HALF-BLOOD PRINCE have gone on sale in Beijing, weeks after it was published & released in English and months ahead of the actual Chinese language edition release. The Chinese people are so wound up about POTTER that they have even started posting illegal translations online.

J.K. Rowlings character is known as "Ha-li Bo-te" in China. The People's Literature Publishing House plans to launch the official Chinese version of the new book October 15th.

The Associate Press reported that "since the English-language release of the latest Harry Potter book, Chinese fans have begun sharing their own translations for free on Web sites, including those run by Beijing's elite Tsinghua and Peking universities."

To try to avoid pirates, The People's Literature Publishing House has even solicited a Chinese name for the book from readers. The book will not adopt the name HARRY POTTER AND THE HALF-BLOOD PRINCE. The title can be translated to Chinese literally, but "half blood" also means "half human, half beast."

The book will be translated by Ma Ainong and her sister Ma Aixin, who have translated the previous HARRY POTTER books to Chinese.